prosthetics

Japanese para-athlete Maya Nakanishi was having some trouble pulling funding together for her trip to the Paralympic games in London this summer, so she decided to get creative; she made a seminude calendar. A time-honored fundraising tradition, the nude calendar takes it to a whole new level when the subject is a visibly disabled woman who’s also an athlete. It’s like a clash of everything people think they know about bodies and disabilities, and it’s a project that definitely gets Maya Push Girl status!
‘I don’t regret having become nude. I’m very happy that I was able to show Maya Nakanishi as I am.’ (NDTV Sports)
Looking at the images from her calendar, what I’m struck by is her amazingly toned and honed body. This is an athlete’s body. It’s all power and strength and compressed energy. It’s a body that’s turned her into a record holder, but it’s also a body that she can play with, and have fun with; I love that we see her wearing several different legs, turning the prosthesis into an accessory that enriches her life, rather than a symbol of “lesser than.”